I don’t know what we were shouting as we flung ourselves against the gates of Buckingham Palace on 20 November 1947 – something ecstatic like maenads in the wake of Bacchus, certainly nothing critical. This was a demonstration of joy.
My fellow maenad was my best friend from St Mary’s Convent in Ascot, Lucy, and we were 15, up from school. I would like to think we were wearing our New Look coats, mine an impractical pale turquoise, hers spinach green, sweeping to the floor and double-breasted to make us seem like a couple of Napoleons, if rather taller.
